


Summit

by loosenoodlepoodledoodle



Series: Adoration of LOONA [6]
Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Horror, LGBTQ Themes, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-04 11:46:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21197138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loosenoodlepoodledoodle/pseuds/loosenoodlepoodledoodle
Summary: LOONA go on a ghost hunt on the East Coast. What could possibly go wrong?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> *5/24/2020 I came back to this after some months, and I hate the last half of it. It is bloated and meandering, and partially this is because I was forcing myself to write to a resolution I didn't necessarily agree with; instead, I was following some kind of logic rather than going with a particular theme or message. Like, the first part is, I think, better, because I did have some kind of theme/message in mind. So I'm going to jump back into this and hopefully it goes better this time.
> 
> *12/14/2020 All attempts to rewrite it have failed. Instead, I took a different tack. See endnote for more.

The van turned up the driveway, and Jo HaSeul stared glumly out the window into the rain. She could imagine how the editors would try to make the moment more palatable to the television audience back home. Cutesy fonts, silly animations, and cheesy sound effects drifted ghost-like through her mind, blotted out by the dark grey of the afternoon.

“The weather should clear up by tomorrow,” said one of their managers, seated up front. HaSeul turned to look at him when she caught her first sight of the house ahead.

“We’ve got to spend the weekend—_in there?”_

The other girls strained to see what had spooked her about it, but by that time the van was already pulling over to the side, and the angle was all wrong, the house in shadow. They hurried to get out of the van and inside before they were soaked through. The only glimpse they could catch was provided by the headlights of the other van as it stopped behind them. But it was too fast.

Inside was dry, but cold. The lights of the crew kept HaSeul from seeing much of the foyer, and she didn’t like some of the nervous looks on their faces. Nobody lived there normally, so when the company had rented the place for this stunt, a few lucky souls had to go early to clean and prep the place.

At least it would be perfectly ready for LOONA.

The old lady who owned the place was waiting impatiently to show them to their rooms. Ordinarily she would be far, far away this close to dark, in fact she seldom came to the house at all, but the company had needed someone to play the part of the wizened and creepy old hag and she was happy to oblige them at the time. Can you blame her? She needed the money. The house provided little income, and was far too stately to be allowed to become a tax write-off.

“You’re late,” she told them. They tried to apologize, but she waved them off, walking to the stairs.

“Those are your bedrooms,” she said, pointing up. “Pink, green, blue, and yellow. Three to a room, decide for yourselves who’s with who. Over there,” and now she pointed to their right, on the ground floor, “is the kitchen hallway. The dining room’s next door. This way to the parlor.”

She led them through a door to their left. They followed her halfway down a hall to a door that had been propped open. Light spilled through, and they found themselves in a sort of sitting room or den, to their eyes. It had a large fireplace, and it was roaring, the only bright spot in their day.

“This is the center of the house. I don’t have time for anything else. Did any of you bring ear plugs?”

The girls were stunned, so she took their silence as a no, and actually smirked.

“If you find a locked door, it’s probably shut for a reason. And don’t go down in the basement.”

And she left them.

***

“What a crazy lady,” said Yeojin.

“And rude,” added GoWon.

“She’s probably just mad about us being so late,” said HaSeul. Several hours late, in fact.

The crew were ready to leave as well. They left the girls a few boxes of pizza and filed out. HaSeul had only a moment to ask their manager.

“What is this? What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” he said, genuinely in the dark. “I’ll try to find out by tomorrow morning. Just remember, we’ve got cameras set up in here, the foyer, the kitchen, the dining room, and the upstairs hallway. Otherwise, you’ve got to film yourselves on your phones. Oh, and if you need help, call 9-1-1, not 1-1-9—”

“I know. I’ve lived here before,” said HaSeul.

The manager looked at her, confused. “Really?”

“Huh? No, I mean, I’ve lived in America before.”

“Oh. Right. Well, ladies,” and he turned to bow to the others, too, “I’m sorry about everything that’s happened today. All the delays, and the…the shortness now, and also the rain, and—”

“_You_ made it rain?” teased JinSoul.

The manager chuckled. “No, sorry! Um, good night? We’ll be back in the morning, no sweat.”

And he hurried off, suddenly aware that his comrades had deserted him.

The girls stared at the doorway, then looked around and at each other.

“What the fuck?” said Hyunjin.

***

The pizza couldn’t heal their pain, but it could paper it over. Three pies, all the same: cheese and pepperoni.

“Are they really so short on cash that this what we get for supper?” asked Choerry.

“What do you mean?” said Yeojin.

“I’ve never had a pizza that was so…so plain. It’s not bad, it’s just…ordinary.”

HaSeul cut them off before Yeojin could agree. “Let’s not talk about money on camera.”

She nodded towards the closest one. It stood silently in a dark corner of the room. Choerry and Yeojin gave her apologetic looks, and they all finished dinner in near silence. This deep into the house, they couldn’t hear the rain falling outside, although the occasional rumble of thunder did visit them. HaSeul finished her plate and looked around. The wallpaper was a strange purple and gold pattern. It reminded her of the _fleur de lis_, but something about it was off. She thought she might lose herself in it, but she drew herself back from the brink.

Everyone was done eating. “Let’s figure out our rooms,” she began.

“We want the pink room,” said Chuu and Yves.

“Mm-hmm,” said HaSeul. They giggled.

“I kind of want the yellow room,” said JinSoul. The rest of Odd Eye Circle concurred.

“That leaves blue and green,” said HaSeul.

“Let’s take the green room,” said Heejin. Hyunjin said yes, and they looked really happy about it. Or as happy as a pair of jet-lagged nineteen-year-olds could.

_They’re almost as obvious as Chuu and Yves are,_ she thought. She continued.

“I’ll take the blue room. What about you four?”

Vivi decided to shack up with Heejin and Hyunjin, and GoWon with Chuu and Yves. That left HaSeul with the _maknaes_.

“Oh, fun times!” said Yeojin.

Olivia Hye remained chill.

***

Blue was an apt description for their room, though perhaps “sky blue” would have been better. HaSeul liked it greatly. It felt so much brighter and warmer compared to the rest of the house thus far. She set down her bag and took a look around. A vanity hung over a long, low dresser, and there was a wardrobe on the opposite side. A large bed with its own curtains stood against the far wall, between two windows. Two smaller beds were tucked in along the side walls, wherever they could fit. Finally, another door, closed, occupied the far right corner.

“That’s probably to the bathroom,” said HaSeul.

“Yay! Can I have the big bed?” said Yeojin.

HaSeul checked out the two smaller ones. “No. I’m pulling rank.”

“Aw, come on, you big meanie!”

“Can’t we all fit in it,” suggested Olivia. “It’s cold in here, and I don’t think this place has _ondol_.”

“Fine,” said HaSeul. She walked over to the far door and confirmed her theory. She also found that it connected to the green room.

“Hi, neighbors,” giggled Heejin. She and the other two peered in through their door.

“Mind if we shower first?”

“Knock yourselves out,” said HaSeul.

“Let’s just all take it together,” said Yeojin.

HaSeul looked at her. “We can’t all fit at the same time.”

“Oh. Duh.”

The three of them waited in their room while Heejin, Hyunjin, and Vivi bathed. They were done faster than HaSeul had expected.

“There’s not much hot water,” Vivi told them, peeking her head out the door.

Yeojin jumped to her feet. HaSeul and Olivia got up more reluctantly.

“Hey,” said HaSeul, “I’d rather take my shower alone.”

“Me, too,” said Olivia.

HaSeul didn’t like the crestfallen look on Yeojin’s face.

***

The water was lukewarm at best. HaSeul hurried to finish up before she froze to death. As she toweled off, she stood by the green room door, casually listening. She wondered if she would hear anything juicy from next door, but they must have gone to sleep. There were no sounds of kissing, no whispered confessions of love, no sordid trysts. All she could hear was the unsexy groans of the pipes adjusting to the changing temperature and pressure.

_ No wonder people think this place is haunted, the plumbing is a horror story._

The door to her room swung slowly open, and Olivia poked her head in. “You done?”

“Yeah, all yours.”

She slipped in and, facing the shower, took off her clothes. HaSeul hurried out, but couldn’t help catching a glimpse of Olivia’s bare breast. It was beautiful, perfect, mesmerizing. Olivia never noticed HaSeul’s face, but Yeojin did. She’d been peeping from the doorway just then.

HaSeul couldn’t keep from blushing, but she acted like nothing had happened. Ignoring the mischievous look on Yeojin’s face, she threw open the bed curtain, drew back the covers and got into bed. It was cold under there, too, but the layers of blankets and bedsheets were heavy, and before long enough of HaSeul’s body heat had radiated throughout that she felt quite comfortable. Soon after, Olivia joined her, her hair still damp. She took a spot as far from HaSeul as she could, facing away. HaSeul wondered if this meant anything. She also dreaded what Yeojin would do.

She was right to. Yeojin exited the bathroom with her pajama top not fully buttoned. She looked almost as try-hard as Dove Cameron, but at least Dove Cameron was twenty years old. HaSeul scooted over to the middle to make room, and told Yeojin to turn off the lights.

“Oh. Right. Duh.”

HaSeul listened as Yeojin bumbled around in the dark. She managed to make it back to the bed, but instead of just sliding in and going to sleep, she tried to get on top of HaSeul. Her slobbery kiss missed her face, landing where her jawline met her neck below the ear.

“What are you doing?” HaSeul whispered.

“Kissing you.”

“Why?”

“I want to go boom-boom.”

At this Olivia Hye made a sound that was both a scoff and a snort. She got up and took the empty bed on that side.

“Good. Now we’re alone. More space to move around in.”

“What’s gotten into you?”

“Nothing. It’s just, now’s our chance. No one around to stop us.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t you know?”

HaSeul answered forcefully. “No. I have no idea.”

Yeojin shifted into a more aggressive position. Now she was straddling HaSeul.

“Why do you think everybody was so eager to go on this trip? It wasn’t to catch some fake-ass ghosts. No, we all relished the idea of a weekend almost all to ourselves. Of course we were thinking of sex.”

“I wasn’t!”

“Bullshit. You had that same wistful look in your eyes that everyone else did.” She stroked the side of HaSeul’s face with her hand.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Can’t you hear them? Listen.” And indeed, there was a rhythmic sound coming from somewhere nearby.

“Someone’s fucking in another room. We’d all be doing it, if we weren’t so tired.”

“No, we wouldn’t.”

“Pssh. Liar. I know what you like. _I caught you peeking at her._ At Hyejoo. She’s gorgeous, isn’t she?”

A gasp was just audible from the other bed.

“So don’t tell me you're not into girls. We’ve been together too long for you to deny it. We’re perfect together! Come on, it’s meant to be!”

“No.”

Now Yeojin was indignant. “Why the hell not?”

“Because you’re still a child.”

Outrage. “So’s she!”

“Not here. Not in America. She’s old enough to join the army here, to even be a pornstar if she wanted.”

“She’s only a year older than me!”

“A year makes a lot of difference.”

“No it doesn’t!”

“You know what, Yeojin? Here’s what I like about Hyejoo. She exudes maturity. And you? You’re still so baby-faced.”

Yeojin got off HaSeul in a hurry. She paused at the edge of the bed.

“You know, it won’t be that long before I meet your _standards_,” she said. “And when that day comes, you’re gonna look at me in a new light, and all you’ll have is your regrets.”

But HaSeul already regretted it.

She heard Yeojin fumble her way to the other bed, stumbling against it in the dark. Soon, everything was quiet, and the three of them were alone with their thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My favorite old movie is 1963's The Haunting, and I have long wished to include it in a fanfic, just not a fanfic about The Haunting.
> 
> *Okay, I'm gonna tell you where that line, "I wanna go boom-boom" came from. My first year teaching in Korea, I had a sixth-grade girl say "boom-boom" to me, pat her butt and blow me a kiss because I helped her with her English hagwon homework. My co-teacher was at the other desk and burst out laughing. I'm not sure if she was laughing at the girl or at my freaked out reaction. Perhaps both. But the kid didn't really mean it, she was just trying to tease me, because she's evil. ㅋㅋㅋ!


	2. Chapter 2

Night thoughts were no match for jet lag, however. When she woke up, HaSeul couldn’t remember lying awake at all. Sunlight tried to enter around the edges of the window curtains, but with little success. She could see that Yeojin had left the bed curtains open when she stormed off. She started to slide over to open them wider when she realized there was an arm around her belly.

It was Olivia’s. She stirred.

“Good morning,” said HaSeul.

“Good morning,” said Olivia. “I had to climb back in. It got really cold last night.”

They opened the bed curtains, and it was bright enough to see that Yeojin’s small bed was unmade. Her bag was still on the floor, and electric light from the hall poured through the open door. _She must have wandered off and not shut it,_ thought HaSeul.

There was a bit of a commotion next door. They checked the bathroom to find their neighbors putting themselves together. From the dreamy expressions on their faces, they could guess what they had been doing.

“Good time last night?” asked Olivia dryly.

The three of them paused and smiled.

“It was…” began Hyunjin.

“Perfect. Just perfect,” finished Heejin.

“Yeah,” added Vivi.

They laughed at HaSeul and Olivia’s expressions, and the two of them gave them their privacy. At the threshold into the hall, HaSeul had a question for Olivia.

“Hyejoo, how much did you hear last night?”

Her heart clenched at the sympathy on Olivia’s face.

“Everything.”

They stepped out into the hall. They could hear the others up and moving, at least some of them. The bedroom doors were set into shallow archways or alcoves, with paneling that matched the rooms’ colored interiors. Across from them was the yellow room, to its right (their left) was the pink room, and down the hall in that direction lay a sort of “T” intersection.

The doors down there all had a sinister feel. Not in any spooky kind of way, it was more of a _“we-can’t-afford-the-upkeep-like-we-used-to”_ sort of way.

“Maybe she went to the kitchen,” said Olivia. HaSeul nodded, and they turned right, to the stairs. They formed their own sort of “T” intersection, going down half a story to a landing and back up again on the other side. More steps down stood perpendicular to them, and the pair of them walked down holding hands. HaSeul noticed that the hall opposite their bedrooms was shorter, and ended with a window instead of more doors.

The foyer was dark, despite the lights being left on. They each opened up curtains, and the place became more inviting. There were gaps in the room, spaces where there had once been paintings or furniture or who knew what else. HaSeul figured that old crone must have been selling things off over the years, and she wondered what it must have looked like in all its former glory.

“Did that camera shut off?” asked Olivia.

HaSeul walked over to check it out.

“Yeah, it must have run out of space and gone into power-saving mode.”

“You would think the crew would be back here already, though.”

HaSeul thought it was odd, too, but she couldn’t think of an explanation to share, so she changed the subject.

“I think the kitchen’s through there.”

She opened the door to the right of the staircase. The hall here had one door in the middle of the left hand side, and the wall on the right was carved up by windows. These had not the heavy curtains of the bedrooms, and thus the hall was much nicer than the one upstairs.

“Look, somebody left masking tape,” said Olivia. There were arrows labeled with their destinations, apparently made by the crew during their initial visit. Straight ahead was the kitchen, and the middle-left door was the dining room.

“How helpful,” said HaSeul. She stepped into the hall and was immediately startled by a cold draft to her left.

“What the heck?”

There was another door there, set back where she hadn’t been able to see it. It was less clean than the others she’d seen, and there was a gap underneath, the evident source of the draft. Written on a piece of tape across the center of it was: _BASEMENT—NO-GO._

They stared at it for a moment, until Olivia suggested that they make breakfast for the others as a surprise treat.

“Oh, good idea.”

They reached the kitchen, and while it was old-fashioned (and somewhat unfamiliar culturally, even to HaSeul) it was well-stocked for their weekend adventure. They decided on eggs, bacon, and pancakes, and everyone was delighted and thankful as they trickled in. For their part, there was another bathroom nearby, little more than a water closet, but at least the two of them didn’t have to rush back upstairs to freshen up, among other things.

But Yeojin never showed up. “Where could she be?” wondered the two of them, as they ate Yeojin’s share of the meal.

“Did something happen between you?” asked Kim Lip.

“Yes,” said HaSeul.

After a moment: “_What_ happened?”

HaSeul swallowed nervously. “We got into a weird sort of fight—”

“Yeojin wanted to make nookie and HaSeul rejected her,” reported Olivia.

HaSeul scowled. “Jeez, Hyejoo!”

“Sorry, but this is too freaky. What if she’s gotten lost? Or she ran away?”

“You’re right,” admitted HaSeul, “we can’t waste any time. Let’s search for her.”

“We should call the crew, too,” said Hyunjin. “Anybody got their phone with them?”

GoWon did, but there was a problem. “We forgot to get new SIM cards! We can’t use our phones here without them!”

“What about emergency calls?” asked HaSeul. GoWon tried, but failed.

“I can’t get a signal.”

There was a landline phone in the kitchen. HaSeul hurried over to try it, but it was dead.

“What the—?”

“Hey,” said Chuu, “what time is it?”

GoWon checked her phone again. Her voice quavered. “It’s about ten o-clock…”

A cold fear spread throughout the room. “Why isn’t the crew here already?” asked JinSoul.

No one had an explanation. It wasn’t like they were in the middle of the wilderness. The hotel the crew were staying at was in a town a few kilometers at most down the road.

“Let’s check the rest of our phones,” said HaSeul.

She knew not to get her hopes up, but she was disappointed all the same. Back upstairs, not a single one of them could get a signal.

“We have to find her,” sighed HaSeul.

“More important, we need to get in touch with the crew,” said Kim Lip.

Several of the others nodded, and HaSeul pointed out that this meant walking to town.

“I’ll do it,” volunteered Kim Lip. JinSoul and Choerry joined her.

“Okay, then,” said HaSeul.

The three of them grabbed their jackets, went down to the front door, and put their shoes back on. The others followed.

“Good luck,” said Olivia.

JinSoul smiled, her black hair shining. “Thanks kid, see you around.”

They opened the front door. Sunlight, brighter and fresher than that from the windows, poured through. The sky was so clear, the absolute opposite of the rain from the night before. It lifted their spirits, and the others waved goodbye to those intrepid three as they began their march down the overly long driveway.

“What’ll you do if the gate is locked?” shouted Heejin.

“Climb over it!” yelled JinSoul. “It’s not that high!”

They laughed, and the others watched until Odd Eye Circle disappeared through the trees.

***

“Let’s leave this door open for now,” suggested Chuu.

They all agreed, and propped it open with some big dumb flower pot. Collectively, they decided to open any and every window they could find, just to let the house breathe. Upon doing so in the foyer, HaSeul and Olivia realized they were severely underdressed.

“We need to change out of these pajamas, I think,” said HaSeul.

“Yeah,” said Olivia.

“We’ll wait for you,” said Yves. “Then when you get back we can figure out our plan of attack.”

The two of them hurried back upstairs to their room. They shut the door behind them, then looked at each other confused. Neither of them had to say what they were thinking: _we’re the only ones here, so do we even need that kind of privacy?_

Olivia went to open the windows, but HaSeul stopped her. “Let’s keep it warmer in here. It feels more cozy that way.”

Olivia nodded, then stepped back to where her bag was. She withdrew jeans, a black sweatshirt, and after a second’s thought another set of underwear. She began to unbutton her pajama top when HaSeul, realizing that she was staring at her, jerked her head away in shame.

She felt Olivia’s hand on her forearm. “It’s okay. You can look. I don’t…I don’t mind.”

HaSeul turned her head back. Olivia was so close now, looking so scared but brave, braver than HaSeul felt, HaSeul shaking, with her breath catching in her throat, and Olivia’s top was open, hanging off her bare shoulders, only held on by their sleeves, and her breasts were only held back by her bra, practically ready to pour out, so perfect, and beautiful, and magnificent—

Yves shouted, _“Come quick, you two!”_ and the moment was lost. Or rather, not lost but only held onto by the tips of their tongues. They threw on their clothes as quick as they could, HaSeul wearing a blue sweatshirt and khaki pants, and they went downstairs arm-in-arm. Olivia’s fresh bra and panties had been left on the bed. If she had stripped down completely, they might have ignored Yves entirely.

_Sorry, Yeojin,_ thought HaSeul. _It’s not only your age; you’re just not my type._

Yves gave them a knowing look as they returned, and Chuu beamed at them, but the other four had been looking out the windows or at the remaining paintings on the walls and didn’t notice anything. Not that they would have cared.

“What’s up?” asked HaSeul.

“This,” said Yves. She pointed to one of the cameras that had been left running overnight. They immediately understood her point.

“Yeojin might be on some of these!” exclaimed HaSeul.

“Right. So when we’re searching this place, let’s grab all the cameras we can find and bring them back here. That way, if we need to, we can look for her on them.”

The others gathered around. They looked to HaSeul for guidance, as she was officially group leader.

“Um, so there are eight of us. We should probably split up. How about half of us stay down here, and the other half go upstairs? Then, one pair can take the left side, and the other the right side.”

That sounded good to them, and the only thing left was to assign sectors.

“I want to go upstairs,” said Chuu.

Yves agreed.

“Then, who else?” asked HaSeul. No one else volunteered.

“Rock, paper, scissors.” GoWon and Vivi lost, so they had to follow Yves and Chuu back up the stairs.

“We’ll go this way,” said Yves. She pointed to the right-hand side, above the dining room and kitchen. That hallway was still nicely sunlit, though not as much as when HaSeul had peered at it earlier that morning. GoWon and Vivi looked down the other way and were askance.

“That way’s scary!” said GoWon.

Yves tried to reassure them. “Our bedrooms are over there, it can’t be that bad. Besides, look over there.” She pointed to the wall with the front door. “That’s the south-facing wall of the house. Over there is the north wall. We know it because we had breakfast in the kitchen earlier. So that is the east wall, and therefore we’ve only not seen the west wall. But look how big everything is so far. There can’t be that much more on the west side!

“Turn left at that junction, and the distance must be short. Turn right, and it’s a little longer, but I’m sure there’ll be another hall coming back around. I bet it’ll connect with ours. You’ll see us in no time.

“We’ll promise not to scare you,” she concluded innocently. From the look on Chuu’s face, her girlfriend relished the opportunity for a prank.

“Is that it?” asked Hyunjin. “No third floor?”

They all looked upward. The stairs ended at the second floor.

“Probably not,” said HaSeul, “but if there is it must only be an attic loft. Check the ceilings for trap doors to be sure.”

“What about a basement?” asked Heejin.

HaSeul shifted nervously. “There is a basement, but let’s tackle that last. We were explicitly warned not to go down there.”

The upstairs girls bade the downstairs girls farewell, and were soon gone from sight. HaSeul asked the other pair which way they wanted to go.

“Right or left?”

“Actually, I kind of want to look in there,” said Hyunjin, pointing.

There was a door to their right, close to the front door. HaSeul had assumed it was a cloakroom or something, and maybe it had been in a past life but now when they opened it they were quite surprised.

“It’s a little office,” said Olivia.

There was a desk and chair across from the door, facing them. Behind it stood a bookshelf, filing cabinet, and a stack of equipment. To the right was a large window, illuminating the whole place. Underneath it was a small leather sofa, and in front of that was an old coffee table. Completing the milieu, and proving that the office was not original with the house, was a flat screen television mounted on the wall.

“Wow,” said Heejin.

HaSeul saw the remote on the coffee table and grabbed it. The television worked, but there were no channels.

“Maybe we can watch the videos on here later on.”

“Better than watching them on the cameras themselves,” remarked Olivia.

***

They pulled themselves away and returned to the foyer.

“I suppose we’ll go left,” said Hyunjin.

The two of them disappeared through the door to the parlor hallway. HaSeul said, “Ah, _shit,”_ and hurried after them. They were quite surprised when the door opened behind them.

“I’m propping the door open,” she said, and comprehension dawned on their faces. She found an empty stand, a block of wood that had once held God-knew-what piece of shit artwork on it, and put it to task as a doorstop. She heard the other two commandeering their own kitschy bit of yesteryear, whatever crap the crone hadn’t been able to pawn, and then Olivia was running up the stairs beside her.

_“Don’t forget to open the doors!”_ she shouted.

_“Yes!”_ came the muffled replies.

Olivia rejoined HaSeul at the foot of the stairs. She made an observation.

“If the house is longer in that direction, then they didn’t really go left, did they?”

“Oh. I guess they went more in the center. Oh well.”

They worked their way back to the kitchen, all the while hearing Heejin and Hyunjin, and Chuu and Yves, moving furniture around to open things up and occasionally shouting Yeojin’s name. Only Vivi and GoWon were too far to be detected regularly.

The kitchen occupied the northeast corner of the ground floor. The room to its west was the music room, bereft of instruments or sound equipment. The only clue to its original purpose was a set of old framed black-and-white photographs hanging on one wall, and a sheath of tattered yellow sheet music on a corner table.

“This is sort of depressing,” said Olivia.

There was a door south. They opened it to find themselves in the parlor hallway. The parlor door was already propped open, and Heejin and Hyunjin’s voices drifted their way.

_“Hey, Yeojin!”_ shouted Olivia. The two of them peered out, perplexed.

“That was quick,” said Heejin.

“She’s not in here,” said Hyunjin.

“There’s another door in here,” said HaSeul. “It’s a French door.”

The four of them approached it together, curious. It stood on the west side of the music room, and was the first locked door they encountered. But they could see through its glass windows easily enough.

The room was some kind of art gallery. Statuary or sculptures sat draped in cloth, and it was easy to tell where there were missing ones. There were also gaps in the wall where paintings had once hung.

“Huh,” said HaSeul. “You can see windows on those two walls, so this must be the northwest corner of the house. I thinks there’s another door over there. If we work our way over, maybe it’ll be unlocked.”

“Or we can find a key,” added Heejin.

HaSeul frowned. One more thing for them to look for.

_“What the fuck is that?”_ blurted Olivia. She had been craning her neck to see.

She pointed something out to them. “Can you see that painting?”

HaSeul could, just barely. It was almost in the corner on the left side. Any closer and it would be invisible to them.

“Is that…is that—_is that a woman fucking a snake-man!?!”_

It was. From the look of her: “I think she’s enjoying it!” said Olivia.

They all burst out laughing, and couldn’t stop for two whole minutes. They could just hear Yves and Chuu somewhere above them, wondering what had happened.

“What the hell is this place?” asked Heejin.

“S-S-Summit House,” sputtered Hyunjin, catching her breath.

HaSeul recalled the briefing they had received before their flight. But the plane had left Incheon in the evening, and had not been comfortable enough to sleep well on. Hence their jet lag, and HaSeul’s fuzzy memory.

“What does that name even mean?” asked Olivia.

“Nothing,” said HaSeul, “it’s just the top of a mountain or hill.”

They had to go back to the parlor to continue on. There was one other door there, across from the one they’d used last night. It opened into another hallway, but HaSeul could tell from the draft and light to their left that it looped back around to the open foyer.

To their right was another set of French doors. Unfortunately, they were also locked, and afforded no opportunity to glean a better view of the room’s undoubtedly sordid contents.

To the left of the gallery was a plain wooden door, locked. HaSeul thought she heard voices on the other side, far away, so she called out.

“The door’s locked!” answered Chuu. Her voice was very faint.

“It must be the servants’ stairs!” said HaSeul.

Chuu skipped a beat. “Okay, then!”

There wasn’t much house left on the ground floor. Just down and across from the parlor was the last door until the bend in the hall. It was unlocked, but there was no way to tell what the room had once been. The carpeting had been pulled up and the wallpaper removed, and bare floorboards and sheetrock were visible. Some of the windows exhibited signs of water damage, too.

“Wow,” said Hyunjin.

They returned to the hall and rounded the bend. Ahead they could see the foyer with its stairs. Not far was the open parlor hallway; they had nearly finished their circuit. But there was one last door here to check.

It stood on the south wall, just beyond the line of sight of the western hallway. _Whatever is here must be under our bedrooms, _thought HaSeul. The door opened easily, and the four of them entered the library.

It was disappointing.

Over half the bookshelves were empty, and much of what was left looked (and smelled) quite dank. The only relatively clean part of the room was a table on their right near the south wall. Someone had been working there with a notebook and clipboard, and HaSeul could see that it was the owner’s catalogue of items sold. She flipped through it and lost interest when she spied a much larger book tucked away on an end table nearby.

_“The Collection at Summit House,”_ she read aloud. Before she could flip it open to check for pornography, there came a pounding from somewhere to the left.

“What is _that?”_ squealed Heejin.

“It’s probably someone trapped behind a locked door,” said Olivia, and she strode towards the sound.

The library opened up on its west side, the southwest corner of the house. The ceiling rose into a three-story tower. _That shape must have been what freaked me out last night when we arrived,_ thought HaSeul. There were empty bookshelves along its second floor balcony, along with a door that HaSeul thought must connect to the bedroom hall. A third floor balcony without any shelves stood on high, next to an odd-looking door with a rattling padlock. This was where the pounding was coming from. Lastly, there was a space in the corner where there once must have been stairs or a ladder, but now was only a safety barrier. Anyone wanting access would have to use the other stairs, or bring a big ladder.

“Yeojin, is that you?” shouted HaSeul.

“No, it’s us again,” said Chuu.

“That door’s padlocked, you’ll have to go back around.”

“Damn it,” muttered Yves.

“How’d they get up there anyway?” asked Heejin.

“I don’t know, but it looks like we’re going to have to watch all that camera footage now.”

***

They waited for the others in the foyer, having gathered all the cameras they could in the meantime, about a dozen. Chuu and Yves soon came tromping down their side of the steps, covered in grime.

“We need to clean ourselves up,” said Yves.

HaSeul smiled at them, and Olivia asked, “What about GoWon and Vivi?”

Chuu frowned. “What about them?”

“Where are they? Haven’t they run into you?”

“We haven’t seen anybody else since we all split up after breakfast. We did _hear_ HaSeul a couple of times.”

Goosebumps spread the length of HaSeul’s spine. She got up and said, “Come on.” Racing up the stairs, she led them back to the bedroom wing. It was deserted.

“Vivi!” she called out. “GoWon!”

She went down the hall. To her left was the second floor door to the library. To her right the hall ended much sooner than she would have thought.

“I thought it would loop back around to the other side.”

Yves shook her head. “It can’t. Our bedroom has north-facing windows. There’s no place for the hallway to wrap around.”

“Then how’d you make it over to this side? We could hear you,” pointed out Olivia.

“We went through the attic,” said Chuu, “that’s why we’re so filthy. All the doors were locked except the one we came through. There’s no way they could have gotten to us, let alone past us.”

There were six other doors in that hallway, all of them locked, as was the door to the library.

“What on earth is going on here?” said HaSeul, distraught. From the looks on their faces, the others felt the same way.


	3. Chapter 3

HaSeul insisted that no one split up from now on. The others waited while Chuu and Yves cleaned up, then all six of them searched the house as a group. They found no one, though they did grab a few more cameras along the way. Yves showed them the way to the attic, but one look in there and HaSeul decided they needn’t bother.

They also tried the basement door, but it was locked tight, too.

Now they sat awkwardly together on the sofa in the front office. Hyunjin checked her phone.

“It’s noon.”

No one said anything for a while, and then HaSeul spoke, shakily. “Guys? What should we do? I don’t—I don’t know what to do.”

Yves was the second oldest present, so she stepped up to the plate.

“If they’re not here, then they must have left the house. So either we stay here, or go outside looking for them.

“Or we could try to follow JinSoul and the others,” she added.

HaSeul turned and looked out the window. The lawn was pleasant looking, but the forest was not. From this angle, she could see the edge of a pale green propane tank around the corner of the house.

“I don’t think we should leave. We could get lost in the woods for days, and even if we don’t we might never find them. And we definitely will never catch up to JinSoul’s team.”

“They must be in town by now,” said Olivia.

“What’s it called?” asked Chuu.

“Bucksville? Burkeville?” offered Hyunjin.

“Maybe Burkittsville?” guessed HaSeul. The others shrugged.

“Then, if we’re all staying,” said Yves, “let’s start watching these vids.”

She got up and, grabbing the camera labeled “West Hallway,” hooked it up directly to the television using a USB cable that they’d found lying around the office.

***

The first video was the most difficult to watch. Not because of anything on it; in fact, there was little at all. It was more the anticipation that drove them mad. Between them going to bed and Yeojin exiting her room at around four in the morning, there was nary a thing at all. Not even the wall lamps in the hallway could be bothered to flicker much.

They broke for lunch, then came back and worked a little more efficiently. By the time dinner rolled around, they had reconstructed Yeojin’s movements. After stepping out, she had gone back to the parlor, evidently for a snack. Unable to find food there, she found her way to the kitchen, taking a swig of milk straight from the gallon and eating a banana. While there, she suddenly looked out a window and freaked out. No camera showed what she saw. She rushed back to the foyer stairs, then froze, listening. Whatever it was, and the cameras certainly didn’t pick up any culpable sounds, it scared the hell out of her. She rushed out the front doors, white as a ghost, and that was the last trace of her.

Now they sat again at the kitchen table, the six of them, like the lowly help eating the laziest of spaghetti dinners. Something close to denial drifted through their thoughts, and confusion as well. They mostly stared at their food, like condemned tributes, although occasionally someone seated facing the right way would dare take a glance out the window, hoping and not hoping to see whatever had terrified poor Yeojin. As for Vivi and GoWon, the cameras had all shut off by the time the rest of them had woken up.

“This is way past some stupid reality show,” declared HaSeul. The others nodded their agreement.

“It’s starting to get dark out. I don’t think we should try looking outside for anyone. Whatever happened to the others could happen to us, especially if we get split up in the woods at night. Let’s just leave all the lights on, grab whatever we want to bring up, and tough it out upstairs.”

“Should we close all the windows?” asked Yves.

“Maybe just on the ground floor. I think we should shut the front door, too, but maybe not lock it. In case the others come back.”

It was not said whether any of them thought something _else_ might come back.

Chuu looked over and pointed at a small door leading outside. Through the window next to it, they could see an extension of the driveway in the growing gloom.

“Is that the only door besides the front door?”

HaSeul had to wrack her brain. “I don’t think so. There must have been one over in the music room.”

“And I think I saw one in that derelict room by the library,” said Hyunjin.

Heejin spoke up. “Speaking of which, can we stop over there again? It’s just that with no television hookup and no internet, we’ll die of boredom before the spooks get us. Surely there’s something left in there worth reading.”

“Good idea,” said HaSeul. They cleared away their dinner and washed the dishes, and HaSeul had them search the kitchen for whatever durable foodstuffs they might fancy as a midnight snack. No sense in repeating what happened last night. Thus did they turn up a pair of flashlights with extra batteries, and a mysterious fancy key on a lanyard.

“I wonder where it goes,” said HaSeul. She twirled it between her fingers.

“No sense trying it now,” said Yves. “Let’s find out in the morning.”

HaSeul nodded and placed the lanyard around her neck.

They took their snacks upstairs then made their final round of the ground floor, shutting windows and turning on every light they could find. It was full dark out when they returned to the library. They were only there for five minutes, settling on a couple sets of old paperback novels. HaSeul could see that they were written for twelve or thirteen-year-olds, but as the others’ English skill was far lower than hers, she thought they weren’t a bad choice. She herself grabbed _The Collection at Summit House_, though she wouldn’t open it until the morning.

They shut the front door, finding a switch for the porchlight, and went upstairs to bed. HaSeul hesitated in the hall.

“Maybe you should move in with one of us,” she said to Yves and Chuu.

Yves was skeptical but Chuu was appreciative.

“What difference do you think it’ll make?” asked Yves.

“It’ll make me feel better,” said Chuu.

They chose to share the green room with Heejin and Hyunjin. The bathroom became a hive of activity as they readied for bed, but no one took a shower this time. As she and Olivia bade the others good night, HaSeul suddenly had to ask: “Did you lock your door?”

Yves gave her a look but Heejin and Hyunjin both nodded yes.

They left the bathroom, shutting the door on their side, and locked their own door to the hall. Then they changed to pajamas, turned out the lights, and crawled into bed with each other.

They couldn’t keep their hands off of each other, but it didn’t go further than that.

After they finished exchanging sweet kisses, they laid there together snuggling, holding each other like they were afraid they would be pulled apart. There was still a commotion in the other bedroom, and both HaSeul and Olivia supposed Yves and Chuu were pushing beds together. Gradually it died down, but it brought our two heroes no closer to sleep.

“I feel like something is about to happen,” confessed Olivia.

“Yeah, I do, too. It’s just too weird. Like, nothing _has_ happened, just people have disappeared and we’re cut off from the outside world. It’s like, nothing’s happened, but that nothing _is_ something. You know what I mean?”

“I think so.”

“So whatever this nothing is building up towards, it’s gotta break soon. Maybe…maybe tomorrow. Yeah, that’s when it’ll happen. Whatever’s going to happen.”

Olivia held HaSeul more tightly. If Olivia hadn’t been there, calming HaSeul with her presence, she would never have fallen asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

All HaSeul could remember from her nightmare was a series of loud noises. When she woke up, she thought that all the interior doors they had left open during the day were being slammed shut.

It was actually someone pounding on the front door.

“What? Why?” murmured Olivia. HaSeul crawled over her and opened the bed curtains, switching on a lamp. Then she opened the window and stuck her head out.

“Who’s down there?” she called out.

“Me and Choerry,” answered JinSoul. “Let us in!”

“But…we left it unlocked…”

JinSoul had not been turning the door knob the correct way. “Oh, crap.”

Olivia was now up, and the others were stirring next door, so HaSeul stepped out into the hall to see JinSoul and Choerry already hurrying up, looking like shit. Their pants and shoes were filthy with mud, and HaSeul was mortified at the tracks they were leaving on the floorboards. JinSoul saw the look on her face and was mildly offended.

“Oh no, we’ve been running and freezing all night, but HaSeul doesn’t want the house to get dirty!”

“No, don’t get mad at her,” said Choerry.

“It’s fine,” said HaSeul. Everyone else was now up and present. “Where’s Jeongeun?”

They shrugged, shaking their heads.

“How far did you get?” asked Olivia.

JinSoul and Choerry shuddered. “Not now, can’t talk about it,” said JinSoul.

“We really need to use the bathroom,” said Choerry.

“Huh? Oh, yeah. You’ve been gone a long time,” said HaSeul.

“We’re all sleeping together on this side,” said Yves. “When you’re done.”

The others returned to the green room while JinSoul and Choerry freshened up in their yellow room. HaSeul left the blue room door open wide.

“Wow, it got really cold. I think we left the upstairs windows open on that side.”

“Yeah, we did,” said Olivia.

“I’ll be right back, then.”

HaSeul headed for the east side second-floor hallway, stopping on the landing to make sure the front door was shut. It was. She then peeked over to either side of the stairs, expecting the first-floor hallway doors to be closed, their makeshift doorstops knocked down.

The doors were open, stops intact and electric lamplight streaming through.

“Like playing _Gone Home_,” she observed quietly.

There was a _thunk_ somewhere below, and HaSeul realized it was the water heater coming on in the basement. Choerry and JinSoul had to shower before bed, and the distinct groans of the plumbing brought the house to life.

She crossed the landing to the other side and entered the east hall. The wall held several windows, and HaSeul felt annoyed at the chore she’d given herself when she was still so tired. She closed the first window, shut the second, and had moved onto the third when she began to stare out, down on the ground.

_ Was that where Yeojin saw it? Saw whatever doomed her? _Then she berated herself for giving up hope so easily. Two had come back; surely everyone else would as well.

Enough light from downstairs spilled outside that she could see the gravel driveway underneath her, the propane tank nearby, and the edge of the forest surrounding them all. _If someone walked out from cover, right this second,_ she thought, _I could see them perfectly well. Could they see me?_

She conceded they almost certainly would.

She was unable to pull her eyes away from the tree line, hoping for and dreading what might step out. Only a subtle change in the quality of light told her something was wrong.

She looked around. It took her a moment to figure what had changed. The hall lights were as steady as they had been all day and night, but when she looked down at the far door, she swore something was wrong about it.

_ Did that…did that door move farther away?_

Yes, it had. So had the light nearest her. That was why the quality of light had changed. She was now in a dimly lit spot, one that had no right to exist.

She turned around and practically jumped out of her skin. The corner leading back to the stairs was several meters farther than it should have been. There was still the same number of windows, and the windows were the same size, so it wasn’t as if the corridor had stretched itself out. It was simply as though it had been constructed larger while her back was turned.

She moved forward, hardly daring to breathe and rounded the corner. Her scream died in her throat.

The stairs were substantially further away, tens of meters even, than they had been two minutes ago. The new gap was pitch dark, too, when before there had been unbroken light. A strange silence enveloped her. She could not hear the bathroom pipes that should have been moaning this whole time.

_ Huh?_

Panic struck her, terror binding her limbs, but she knew if she didn’t run the house would swallow her up. Perhaps that was what had happened to Vivi and GoWon. Perhaps Yeojin was lucky that whatever she had witnessed had driven her from the house.

_Run…_

She went into a full sprint, as if she were at the Idol Star Athletic Competition again, and at first it seemed to be working. The stairs inched closer, but not enough, and then they seemed to stop.

_ Run!_

Her lungs burned as she went all out, but she couldn’t even hear her feet pounding the floor. She feared she would tire out soon and collapse in that darkness. Then the stairs began to recede.

_“Hyejoo!”_ she screamed. Olivia stepped out from the bedroom as if in slow motion, and suddenly the hall and stairs were back to normal. HaSeul stumbled down to the landing, and immediately leaped up the other side, gritting through the pain. Olivia was there, looking scared and confused, and HaSeul threw her arms around her. Other doors opened, and raised voices were asking what had happened. She saw JinSoul and Choerry step out of their room, dressed in pajamas with their hair almost dry.

She looked into Olivia’s eyes. “How long was I gone?”

“I don’t know. Maybe five minutes?”

HaSeul buried her face in the nape of Olivia’s neck. “You can’t be alone here for even a moment!”

***

HaSeul explained to everyone what she had experienced. Olivia looked scared, Yves looked confused, and Heejin, Hyunjin and Chuu looked uncertain how to take the news. But JinSoul and Choerry reacted nonchalantly.

“Woods were like that,” said JinSoul. “Say, where’s Vivi and…”

But she stopped short upon seeing their reaction.

Choerry and JinSoul brought their bags into the blue room. Rather than pushing furniture around or sleeping separately, the two of them piled into the big bed with HaSeul and Olivia. JinSoul was out like a light, her arm draped over HaSeul’s middle, pressing against the under part of her breasts. Choerry had lain down on top of Olivia, and once her eyes had adjusted, HaSeul could see that she was still awake.

She turned over to her side. “Are you really not gonna tell us what happened?” she whispered.

Choerry fidgeted uncomfortably. “Wait ‘til breakfast.”

HaSeul sighed. She saw Olivia turn her head in the dark, but she couldn’t make out the expression on her face. She would’ve kissed her goodnight (again), but that would have meant leaning forward, and JinSoul’s arm held her in place. Instead she closed her eyes, thinking of her sweetheart’s face as she fell asleep.

She woke up well after sunrise. Daylight bled through the curtains, and she could hear the girls next door going about their business. She was thankful that JinSoul had turned away from her in the night, removing her arm.

She sat up. Olivia was already moving, trying to shimmy her way out from under Choerry. HaSeul laughed as she fell out of bed onto the floor.

They smiled cutely at each other.

HaSeul made her own way out, crawling to the foot of the bed and slipping under the curtain. She sat down with Olivia in front of the window, basking in the sun.

Somebody knocked on the bathroom door. They heard it open, and Yves whispered, “Are you guys awake yet?”

HaSeul tried to answer quietly, but JinSoul jerked about suddenly and yanked the bed curtains open.

Choerry reacted more demurely.

They got dressed and put together and joined the others in the green room, HaSeul making sure to wear the key and lanyard she’d found at dinner around her neck. She marveled that she had not gotten a good look at the other bedroom before. The green was nicely accented by mahogany paneling, there was a love seat and chairs, and it also had a fireplace.

Yves took charge, to HaSeul’s surprise. “Are you ready to go downstairs?”

They nodded yes, and HaSeul and Olivia exchanged a look. Yves opened the door to the hallway, peeked out left and right, then led everyone onward, HaSeul and Olivia bringing up the rear. As they walked holding hands, they slammed right into JinSoul and Choerry.

“What is it? What’s going on?”

Then they saw it.

Yves was standing slack-jawed, Chuu crying with her arms around her. In front of them, hanging on the wall above the landing was a painting. Ever since they had arrived, that place had been empty, like so much of the house. But some unknown artist had been busy. Most of the scene within was dark and empty, but there were four figures standing here and there.

Four familiar figures.

“Is this some kind of sick joke?” said Heejin.

Slowly, one by one, they slipped past it, leaning away as far as they could. From the gasps that followed, HaSeul knew more fun awaited in the foyer below.

“It’s actually kind of pretty,” said Olivia.

“I see what you mean,” agreed HaSeul.

They entered the foyer, where everyone else was agape. There were now twelve more new paintings hanging around the room. Eight were blank dark canvasses, but four were individual portraits of Yeojin, Vivi, GoWon, and Kim Lip. The artist had made them beautifully, though their lips were too red and their eyes followed them around the room in ubiquitous gaze.

Yves stood in the center, composing herself. Everyone gathered around her. HaSeul was glad they weren’t all looking to her anymore, though she also felt a little sad about it.

“Let’s see if anything else has changed,” Yves said quietly.

The doors to the interior hallways were still propped open. The library was still a mess, the office by the front door was as they had left it, and the view out the front door was unchanged.

Yves led them back to the kitchen. They made breakfast, and as they ate Yves looked expectantly at JinSoul and Choerry.

JinSoul blanched, but Choerry was up for the task.

“We were almost at the front gate when we heard Yeojin screaming in the woods. We went after her, and sometimes we think we saw her. But we never found her. We only got lost. After a few hours, the forest started to get weird, like what happened to HaSeul last night. Dark and distorted. We don’t know when Jeongeun went missing, and we almost got separated ourselves. We were really starting to panic when night fell. But no matter what, we could see the lights of the house in the distance. We made it back to the driveway, and once we were walking across the lawn, everything started to feel normal again.”

Yves and the rest digested this, and HaSeul tried to be helpful.

“Do you want to know what we saw on the videos?”

“Oh? I forgot about those,” said Choerry.

JinSoul nodded, and HaSeul explained.

“So that really could have been her outside,” said JinSoul.

Yves bit her lip in thought, then spoke. “Let’s put together everything we know about what’s going on, then maybe we can come up with a real plan.”

Everyone gave her their rapt attention.

“Yeojin, GoWon, Vivi, and Jeongeun are all missing. We know Yeojin saw something, and heard something that made her flee outside. Jeongeun somehow got picked off while you were lost in the forest. Vivi and GoWon disappeared upstairs, but they might’ve been separated before it happened.”

“What do you mean by that?” asked Hyunjin.

Yves turned to HaSeul. “You were alone when you were attacked, but you escaped when you saw Hyejoo, right?”

“Yes.”

“So whatever we’re facing, it must need to get us alone, or at least it has an easier time of it if we are. So you were right yesterday not to let us split up.”

HaSeul felt strangely gratified.

“But if we do split up,” Yves continued, “let’s stay in groups of four. Now, the other thing we know is that even though the phone line is out, we can’t be completely cut off from the outside world, because we’re still getting electricity.”

“But if we’re not cut off, then why hasn’t the crew made it back here?” asked Olivia.

“I don’t know. The house must be doing something to keep them away.”

“The house?” whimpered Chuu.

“Yes. The house. What else could it be?”

“But,” said Chuu, “how are we supposed to fight against it? The supernatural? It breaks all the rules…”

Yves opened her mouth to respond, then shut it. It dawned on her, then the rest of them, what the answer was.

_You can’t,_ thought HaSeul. _You can’t fight against it._


	5. Chapter 5

The phone rang, jolting everyone. While HaSeul was the closest to it, she hesitated to pick it up, so Yves went over and answered it.

“H-hello?”

Wary relief spread across her face.

“Yeojin! Where are you?” HaSeul felt relieved as well.

“Okay, we will, but you have to tell us where to look. Are you in the house somewhere?”

Yves looked worried, and HaSeul interjected, “Is she with the others?”

“Yeojin, are the others with you?” Now she looked perplexed.

“Who are _they?”_

Yeojin screamed, so loudly that Yves had to hold the phone away from her ear. The others could hear it, too, until it was suddenly cut off as the line went dead.

“Jesus,” muttered Yves, as she hung up the phone.

She began to explain what happened. “It was Yeojin, she’s somewhere dark and lonely. I don’t think she knows about the others, but something else is menacing her.

“If that was really her,” she added.

“What, do you think it could be a trick?” asked Hyunjin.

“Whatever’s got them made those paintings, so, yeah. Besides, weren’t we all thinking about leaving? That can’t be a coincidence.”

“But…that scream…” said HaSeul.

“Either it was really her, or it was a fake,” said Yves. “Whichever it was, I don’t think there’s anything we can really do about it. If we search the house, or the woods, we won’t find her. At best we waste another day. At worst? We’re each picked off one by one, and no one ever sees us again.”

As much as they would hate to admit it, none of them could disagree with Yves’s analysis.

“Shall we go, then?” she asked them, pointing to the side door.

As they stood up, the phone began ringing again. They ignored it, following Yves outside. Just as HaSeul was crossing the threshold, the last one out, she heard Vivi shouting for help from off towards the parlor.

“Just ignore it,” said Yves.

Then there were footsteps overhead. Out of the remaining open windows on the second floor, they could hear GoWon crying out for help, for them to find her, for them to stay with her.

“Come on,” said Yves. She led them back towards the front of the house. As they passed the propane tank, HaSeul came close to having a panic attack as she imagined the house somehow detonating it as they were all bunched up together. But that must have been something it couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do.

They reached the front lawn. HaSeul and Olivia looked back and saw the front door was open, pitch-black within. Vivi’s voice was calling to them from there, and Gowon’s had moved closer as well.

“This is torture,” Olivia confided to HaSeul.

At the end of the short lawn, the driveway zigged and zagged its way through the trees to the gate at the bottom of the hill. A stone path with steps, overgrown with moss and weeds, made a direct shortcut all the way down. Yves paused here.

“Do you think this is safe?” she asked JinSoul and Choerry.

“Yeah, we used it just—”

Kim Lip cut off JinSoul with a scream. The girls all looked around, but the trees about the driveway weren’t very dense. Given how loud she was, Kim Lip ought to have been visible to them.

Yves told them as much. “See? It’s a trick.”

She told everyone to hold hands, and she and JinSoul led everyone down the hill. Yeojin’s voice joined Kim Lip’s for a time, but then everything went quiet at about the second _zig._

“Do you think we’ve won?” asked Olivia.

“Nope,” said HaSeul, “it’s probably just gathering its strength for something bigger.”

How right she was. The day darkened, and one look up showed it wasn’t from a passing cloud.

“The trees are taller behind us!” said Heejin. They all stopped and saw this was true.

“Let’s keep moving,” said Yves.

Another problem arrived. “This path is longer than it was yesterday,” said JinSoul.

“And the steps are getting bigger,” said Choerry.

“You don’t say,” said Yves. Something about the way she said it made everyone laugh, at least weakly. It did wonders for their morale, and HaSeul started to think it must have countered whatever power was working against them, because they reached the bottom _zag_ soon after.

“We’re almost there,” said JinSoul. “The gate’s maybe a hundred meters ahead, after the drive straightens out. There’s a big meadow on the right side.”

“This is where we first heard Yeojin yesterday,” added Choerry.

As soon as she said this, they were assailed by a cacophony of voices.

“Why are you doing this? You can’t just walk away and leave us to die!” said Kim Lip.

“What will people think when you show up and the police find our bodies?” asked Vivi.

“They’ll think you killed us,” said GoWon. _“They’ll string you up!”_

“Stay together!” Yves urged. They continued on.

The voices came closer. HaSeul could hear footsteps behind them, solid bodies pushing through the underbrush. She thought she could see glimpses of them out of the corner of her eye.

“If you were really here, you’d shut up and join us!” she scolded them.

The phantoms merely laughed.

_ “Sassy bitch!”_

_ “Murderer.”_

_ “You’re abandoning them. Just like you’ll abandon your career!”_

_ “You know they used to hang people here? They called it Gallows Woods.”_

_ “Try it, it’s what you deserve.”_

There was a commotion ahead as several people screamed. HaSeul and Olivia saw the nooses and ducked.

_ “Oh, no fair! Don’t you wanna play?”_

HaSeul felt a hand slap her butt. “It’s okay,” said Yeojin’s voice, “I forgive you for leaving me. It’s not _your_ fault I got taken. But,” and she said this in a faux whisper, “it would mean a lot to me if you killed yourself. _Just like I did.”_

“Fuck off, _나쁜 새!”_ snarled HaSeul.

The others laughed at her brazen snark. The tension snapped, breaking the spell. The nooses were all gone, as were their phantom friends. A look back showed the trees upslope were back to normal, too. Everyone gathered around to give HaSeul an appreciative pat on the back.

“Well done,” said Yves.

All HaSeul could do was lean against Olivia and shrug meekly.

***

“That looks pretty normal,” said Heejin. They were now at the gate, composed of wrought-iron bars. Traffic on the road beyond, while not heavy, was regular enough that they could already hear the occasional car passing by.

_What could go wrong here,_ thought HaSeul. The gate was chained shut. Ivy smothering it prevented them from getting a clear view of the other side.

“We’re going to have to climb,” said Yves. “It shouldn’t be a problem boosting most of us up, and once the first few are over, they can pull up the rest of us.”

“But…” said Olivia.

“But someone has to go last. I think we’ve seen how dangerous that can be.”

They all shivered at the thought.

“If nobody’s going to volunteer, then I guess we’ve got to pick some other way.”

“You mean like, draw straws?” asked Choerry.

Yves shook her head. “Did anyone bring any?”

They had not.

“Then let’s play rock-paper-scissors.”

The game lasted several rounds, and HaSeul was flabbergasted when Olivia lost. She immediately volunteered to stay with her to the end.

Yves, however, had decided to go first. “Help me up,” she said to JinSoul.

She made it to the top, perching precariously as she positioned herself for the drop. She let go, and HaSeul thought she saw her expression change as a wave of dizziness rolled over them all.

“What was that?” asked Hyunjin.

“Yves?” called out Chuu. “Yves?”

They pressed against the gate, but they couldn’t see if Yves was there on the other side.

“Are you alright, Yves?” asked Chuu. “Yves?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Yves answered, exasperated. “I just took a little tumble.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know, I felt funny and landed weird.”

“Can you get up? I want to see that you’re alright.”

Suddenly HaSeul could see her, just barely.

She was grinning.

“Are you ready to come over, Chuu?”

“Yeah, sure,” said Chuu with relief. JinSoul had an odd expression on her face, but she didn’t say anything. She got ready to boost Chuu up.

“What do you think that was?” asked HaSeul.

“What was what?” Yves replied innocently.

“That thing we all just felt.”

“Oh, that. Probably the house being bitter over losing. It may do it for each of us.” Again with the grin.

Up went Chuu, ready to rejoin her girlfriend. She got hung up trying to get her leg over, and Yves said something odd.

“Just give me your hand, and I’ll pull you down.”

Chuu was taken aback. “But that’ll hurt! You could dislocate my shoulder!”

Yves skipped a beat. “No I won’t.”

Chuu looked down at her like she was crazy, then suddenly she screwed up her face.

“Don’t grin like that. It’s creepy—”

She fell back with a squeal as Yves lunged up at her. JinSoul managed to catch her.

“What are you playing at?” yelled JinSoul. Yves laughed.

HaSeul couldn’t see her through the gate anymore. She took a step back, and Yves thrust her arm through it trying to grab her.

_ “Where are you going?” _she asked, her voice strange._ “Didn’t you _want_ to leave?”_

“Oh God, it got her,” wailed Chuu.

_“Yes,”_ said Yves, _“we’ve got her. And it’s only a matter of time before we get you, too.”_

“Why are you doing this?” shouted Olivia.

_“Why?”_ scoffed Yves. _“Why do beings do anything? It’s in their nature.”_

“Give us back our friends!” demanded HaSeul.

_ “Never. We never give up a piece in our collection.”_

“You will to us!” HaSeul thought desperately. “We’ll burn down the house and forest if we have to.”

This gave Yves pause. _“Not with you in it.”_

“If it comes to it,” said Olivia.

Yves said nothing else, and when HaSeul dared to peek through again she was indeed gone. But as they turned to each other, her disembodied voice spoke one more time, from all around them.

_ “You can’t leave, and no one is coming for you. We’ve seen to that. You cannot outlast us, and eventually you’ll make a mistake, just like you did today._

_“Six down, six to go,”_ she added.

They stood in silence together, Chuu gently crying. Everything had gone back to normal, although they couldn’t hear the passing cars any longer. Perhaps it had only been a ploy by their enemy to lull them into a false sense of security.

“What did she mean by ‘six down, six to go’?” asked Hyunjin.

Heejin frowned. “Wasn’t she just taunting us?”

“Yeah, but I thought there were seven of us, now.”

A quick tally proved her wrong.

“Where’s Choerry?” asked JinSoul.


	6. Chapter 6

The hike back to the house was interminable. The phantoms played coy, but the house did not. As soon as they had reentered the shade of the trees, the driveway doubled in length, and the forest in depth. The shortcut stairs were completely overgrown, and they were forced to follow the looping curves of the drive, which were strangely untouched by the mad plants.

“Hey,” said HaSeul, “there must be some kind of limit to what that—those—things can do. Otherwise, how come the driveway’s almost normal?”

JinSoul gave her a look. “_This_ is almost normal?”

Time began to run too fast. Already the sun was going down, even though each of their phones agreed it was before ten in the morning. By the time they reached the front door, they were running down their batteries to see where they were going.

Choerry and Yves were there to greet them from their portraits. Their staid, elegant poses were betrayed by the mirth on their faces. In the glow of the phones, the house having gone dark before they had returned, they looked absolutely sinister.

The girls entered the front office and sat down. The electric switches didn’t work anymore.

“What are we going to do?” asked Hyunjin.

“I don’t know,” said HaSeul.

“I think we need to get more light,” said Olivia.

“How do you figure?” said HaSeul.

“Whatever we’re facing, it has weaknesses. Our laughter, maybe our love for each other; but also light. I think that’s why the lawn felt so much more natural.”

“So, what?” said Heejin. “We go back to our rooms for the flashlights?”

“Yeah, and maybe ignite a fireplace.”

Someone tapped on the window. It was Yves, grinning with a faint red glow in her eyes, like the kind flash photography would cause in pictures once upon a time. Choerry and Kim Lip stood at her sides. They reached right through the solid glass and tried to grab Chuu. Only a quick shove from JinSoul saved her, though the cost was high. JinSoul stumbled, dropping her phone. One touch from Kim Lip and she vanished into thin air.

_“Jesus Christ!”_ screamed Hyunjin. They were now standing, backs against the television screen. GoWon materialized in the shadowed corner and almost got Hyunjin. She wrapped her hands around her arm, but before she could pull her into _nowhere_, Heejin pulled Hyunjin back while shoving her phone into GoWon’s face.

GoWon snarled like an animal and vanished.

“Oh God, we’re dead!” sobbed Chuu.

“Don’t say that!” snapped Olivia.

“Well, what are we gonna do?” asked Hyunjin. “They don’t like light, but they made the sun go down. The power’s off, and our batteries could run out any second.”

“The parlor,” said HaSeul. Olivia looked at her encouragingly. “We just have to start a fire there.”

“But what if there’s no—”

“Come on, Chuu, Hyunjin, just trust me! We’ll figure it if we have to, but we can’t stay here!”

“They’re back,” said Olivia.

The phantoms leered at them, but they could do nothing while so illuminated. HaSeul turned to the door but found Vivi blocking her path.

“Get out of my way.”

_“Eat me,”_ teased Vivi.

HaSeul ignored the taunt and told the others, “We need to keep a tight formation. Lock your arms together. We can go slowly, but make sure we have a light shining in every direction.”

She grabbed JinSoul’s phone and looped her arms with Olivia and Chuu. Heejin and Hyunjin brought up the rear, and they were able to force Vivi back and step out of the room.

More phantoms were waiting for them. They stayed back, content to torment the girls from afar, jeering at them as they inched towards the hallway door. Before HaSeul could see into it, JinSoul stepped out and shoved away their makeshift doorstop with her foot, then slammed the door shut. The clink of the lock engaging was horribly loud.

“Oops,” she teased.

HaSeul drove her off with her phone, then fumbled with the key around her neck.

“Do you think it’ll fit?” asked Olivia.

“If this is the type of key I think it is, then definitely.”

She breathed a sigh of relief when it worked. The phantoms voiced their disappointment with a moment of silence.

“Come on,” said HaSeul.

They made it through the door, but a few steps in and a wave of dizziness struck them as the hallway elongated itself before their very eyes.

“No way,” said Hyunjin.

“Enough!” shouted HaSeul. The anger in her voice surprised the house, which was primarily used to dealing with timorous victims. The hallway righted itself, and they swiftly reached the parlor door.

It slammed shut in front of them.

“Bastards,” muttered HaSeul, and Olivia actually giggled. The door wouldn’t open, however. It wasn’t locked. It was more like someone was holding it shut on the other side.

“We’ll have to go around or something,” said HaSeul. She looked behind them. The dining room door was wide open, as they had left it the day before.

“In here.”

Once inside she instructed them to check for candles and matches in all the cupboards and drawers. The house, realizing its mistake, sent all its phantoms in a rush, but they were powerless to stop them.

Or almost, at least.

“Chuu, baby, why are you doing this to me? Come here, we can be happy together. Forever…”

HaSeul hurried over to Chuu, putting her arm around her waist to prevent her from doing anything rash. But she needn’t have worried so much.

“Yves, baby,” she said, “I’ve got a better idea. Why don’t you come to me?”

HaSeul’s jaw dropped when Yves’s phantom almost took Chuu up on her idea. She twitched oddly, and actually took one step toward her when the house vanished her away before its spell could break. It drew back the other phantoms as a precaution, too.

“Oh my God,” said Chuu, “did you see that? It almost worked!”

“Unbelievable,” said HaSeul. Feeling so relieved, they leaned into each other, and something intimate passed between them. They flinched when Olivia struck the first match.

“There’s so many, we can each take a candlestick.”

Thus armed, with a phone in one hand and a candle blazing in the other, they approached the parlor door again. HaSeul slipped her phone into her pocket, next to JinSoul’s, and felt no resistance from the doorknob. The house only had one trick left up its sleeve, and it tried to blow the candles out. But Heejin shut the dining room door behind them, killing the wind before it could pick up.

They filed into the parlor. All the phantoms, minus Yves, were waiting for them. GoWon held a knife to Vivi’s throat, and through her the house said, _“Put out your lights and give up, or we will kill all of them. Do not test us.”_

HaSeul stared GoWon down. “No. How about you let everyone go?”

GoWon laughed, and it made HaSeul’s skin crawl.

“GoWon, please,” begged Chuu, “you don’t want to hurt Vivi, do you? You don’t want to hurt anyone…”

GoWon began to shake, and then she disappeared, dropping the knife. HaSeul could see it was left over from their pizza meal. Vivi started to stir, then she disappeared as well. Finally, the house vanished the others, unsure that it could still control them. But it left the remaining girls with one final message.

_“You win this time, churls,”_ it said. Its voice was completely uncategorizable, composed of the house vibrating as if a heavy truck or train was passing close by. _“You’ll regret it. When we take you, and we will, we will have prepared for you such unimaginable suffering, that it cannot be contained within a single universe.”_

HaSeul and Chuu stood there agape. Olivia and the other two diligently got a new fire going in the fireplace, and as its warmth washed over them, the darkness of the house faded. Looking out the open door to the west hallway, they saw daylight appear, leaking in from the foyer and the gallery. HaSeul checked her phone. Her battery was down to five percent, and it was just past eleven.


	7. Chapter 7

They went upstairs to grab the flashlights, among other things, and to freshen up. They all noticed the lack of hot water, but it was HaSeul who realized its significance.

“I thought the lights were out because the house was suppressing them, or something. But it must be simpler than that. If the water heater didn’t come on, then there’s no electricity at all.”

The others looked at her. “How does that make things simpler?” asked Heejin.

“Because, if the power is out, we just need to find a circuit breaker and turn it back on. Then we’ll have light again!”

Hyunjin started to put it together. “Then we’ll be in a better position…to fight back?”

“Yes.”

Olivia tilted her head to the side. “But isn’t the basement locked?”

HaSeul pulled out her lanyard. “Yes, but this key should work.”

“I thought that was to the door in the foyer?”

“It was, but it should work on every lock. It’s a skeleton key. Lots of old Western houses have them. I’d forgotten they were a thing, but it makes sense. Why else would someone leave it in a kitchen cabinet next to the side door along with the flashlights and batteries?”

The others perked up at this, except for Chuu.

“Okay, say you get the lights on. How do we get the others back from…from _nowhere_?”

HaSeul put her hand on Chuu’s shoulder. “We call them back. You saw how the house had to take Yves away. You almost had her! I’m sure once we’re in a stronger position, we’ll be able to draw them out. Then we’ll break the spell of this place and escape.”

“And hopefully burn it down on the way out,” added Olivia.

Everyone laughed.

“Are we going to do it now?” asked Hyunjin. “It’s just, it’s almost lunch time and I’m still feeling really out of it from everything we’ve been through this morning.”

“Me, too,” said Heejin.

“How can you say that?” admonished Chuu, astonished. “Our friends are trapped in some hell dimension, and you’re feeling _peckish_? Lunch can wait!”

Heejin and Hyunjin blushed, turning away guiltily, but HaSeul stood up for them.

“It’s all right, we can spare twenty minutes for a breather. No sense in going down there at the end of our tether. Besides, there are only two flashlights. I only want one other person going with me. I’d go it alone, but that seems too risky,” she confided to them.

Olivia took her hand and pulled her closer. They looked into each other’s eyes, and kissed.

Then the look on the others’ faces made them shy all of a sudden.

***

HaSeul and Olivia laid down together on the big bed in the blue room. They didn’t bother taking their shoes off. No way were any of them expecting to sleep in that house ever again.

The two of them snuggled, holding hands. HaSeul tried to intertwine her leg with Olivia’s but she stopped when it didn’t quite work. Meanwhile, Heejin and Hyunjin were sitting upright on Yeojin’s bed, sampling their remaining snacks, and Chuu stood around unsure of what to do.

“Come here. Cuddle with us,” said HaSeul.

She reached out to Chuu, who took her hand and climbed over top of them. Before she could settle in, she saw something on the end table and leaned over to grab it. It was the book _The Collection At Summit House._

“I never got around to reading this,” said HaSeul.

“Do we want to now?” asked Olivia.

“Eh. Why not? We can just flip through it. Maybe it’ll be helpful somehow.”

The three of them held the book up together. HaSeul knew the other two weren’t nearly as good at reading English as she was, but she didn’t want to read it aloud, either. Instead she just lightly skimmed the introduction page, enough to know how old the house was (some 150 years, or thereabouts) and that it always had a reputation for “quirkiness” (HaSeul thought: _Good grief_), and in any event the house had an eclectic collection of _*yawn*._

The first half of the book showcased the relatively normal parts of the old art collection, and they got through it without epiphany. The middle was where it got interesting for them.

“This is really dirty,” whispered Chuu.

“Ha! My snake-man fuck-boy!” said Olivia.

HaSeul had to admit that there was something mesmerizing, even enticing, about the sheer amount of weird pornography thinly disguised as art at this hell house.

“Let’s hurry up, I don’t want to get too distracted by this,” said HaSeul.

They flipped to the end of the book and had quite a fright. The last section, entitled “Newest Additions,” featured the painted portraits the house had added to the foyer. Under each one was a caption and a crime-scene photograph showing the subject dead, like something out of a snuff film. One look at Yves’s grinning face minus her eyes made Chuu fling it across the room in a single violent motion.

Heejin and Hyunjin were stunned.

“What the fuck happened?”

HaSeul, Olivia, and Chuu got to their feet.

“Fuck this house,” said HaSeul.

***

The parlor was just as they had left it. Heejin, Hyunjin, and Chuu were to stay there by the fire while HaSeul and Olivia braved the basement. HaSeul didn’t think the bedroom would be safe for them to stay in, in case the house made it night time again.

But there were no windows in the parlor, and the house couldn’t affect the flames.

“Just keep close here, and if you see us make sure you use the candles to check if it’s really us.”

Chuu looked at HaSeul and frowned. “I wish there was something more we could do to help you.”

“There is. Try calling Yves and the others. If you can keep them coming to you, maybe there won’t be as many of them coming after us.

“We’ll keep a trail of lit candles going, at least on this floor. That way, if you need to go to the kitchen or whatever, it’ll be a little safer for you.

“Well, I don’t know what else to say. If we take too long, something may have gone wrong. In that case…I guess you’ll just have to choose what to do on your own. But you’ll only have candles for light.”

“Good thing there’s like a million of them in the dining room,” quipped Olivia.

They all laughed together, for one last time. HaSeul swallowed nervously.

“Um, good luck.”

Hyunjin shook her head. “You’re the ones who need luck!” And she crossed the short but deep gulf between them and kissed HaSeul full on the mouth. The other two followed suit, and then kissed Olivia as well.

Chuu teased HaSeul in a whisper in her ear. “When Yves comes back, I’m sure she’ll want us to give you a hero’s thanks…”

HaSeul felt an eager sort of tingle run along her spine as she thought about this “thanks”. It spread further when she imagined what the others might do in kind. Then she thought of Yeojin, and the moment was lost.

_Ick_, thought HaSeul.

***

They had left some candles burning in the dining room which were still going strong, although wax had started to drip on the furniture.

“Let’s add some more,” said HaSeul. “Then maybe light up the kitchen, too.”

Olivia nodded.

As HaSeul readied a massive Evergreen & Honeycomb bomb candle, Yves materialized nearby. She was still missing her eyes.

“Don’t let Chuu see you like that, Yves,” said HaSeul loudly and clearly. “You know how much she loves you.”

Yves twitched, her face returning to normal before she disappeared. JinSoul immediately took her place, absent wounds.

“You know what’s really funny, HaSeul? Yeojin actually likes it in here. _She likes it with us. That’s how much you broke her heart, you bitch.”_

HaSeul was taken aback, and Olivia had to step in to drive off JinSoul with her flashlight. She took HaSeul by the shoulders.

“Don’t listen to them, babe. You know they’re lying, don’t you?”

“I know, it’s just, I was caught off guard. I’ll be fine.”

But HaSeul remembered their first night, and she wasn’t sure it was a lie at all.

They entered the kitchen, and saw that the house had veiled the sun once more. No phantoms were inside, but they did see several watching them through the windows. The house had adorned them like the death photographs in the book, but a quick pass with their lights returned their appearances to normal. They continued to stare, however.

“What do you make of that?” asked Olivia.

“I don’t know. Maybe they’re just waiting for us to let our guard down.”

“Should we try talking to them?”

HaSeul gave it a shot. “Vivi? Vivi! Heejin and Hyunjin are waiting in the parlor! Why don’t you go join them by the fireplace. Doesn’t that seem like a good idea?”

But Vivi didn’t react at all.

“It’s like they’re being held in reserve,” said Olivia.

“Right. In case we fuck up.”

They lit and placed candles all over the room, in whatever locations could take them. Some of the phantoms stepped back when a candle came too close, but apart from that they only stared. HaSeul had just finished when she realized there were only five of them. Yves and Yeojin were missing.

They went back to the dining room for more, but by this time they were scraping the bottom of the barrel. Still, there was enough left to fill two candelabras in a display case. They had room for three candles each. HaSeul wanted to carry them into the basement as a backup for the flashlights.

“I wish we’d had some of these the first night,” said Olivia. “I kind of want to take a bath in this smell.”

“I know, right?” Then a wave of paranoia swept over HaSeul. What if this was another trick? What if the house could get them through smells? She knew it had some limits, but she didn’t know all of them.

“Hey, are you okay?” asked Olivia. “What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing. Just freaking myself out.”

Olivia stepped close. “I’m still here with you.” She kissed HaSeul the way Hyunjin and the others had. It calmed her down.

HaSeul took a deep breath. “Okay. Here comes the hard part. We’ve got to go through the hall and unlock the door. It’s probably the best spot for an ambush, at least until we’re in the basement itself. When we are, we’ve got to look for the circuit breaker box or whatever it’s called. I expect there’ll be wires stuck to the ceiling, we just have to follow them. That big gas canister is on this side, and so is the phone in the kitchen. So we pick the direction that looks like it’ll lead toward the foundation on this side. Or maybe it’ll be the corner under that office, by the front door. Who knows, really.”

Olivia put her hand on HaSeul’s shoulder, then caressed her cheek with it. “This is a good plan, HaSeul. I know it’ll work.”

They opened the door to the east hall. Vivi, Choerry, and Kim Lip stood watching them from the driveway. To their left, up the hall, was GoWon, in front of the kitchen door. To their right, near their goal, was JinSoul, standing in the open doorway to the foyer.

“Tight formation,” said HaSeul.

They reached the basement door unmolested. HaSeul had to put down her flashlight to free her right hand to fumble with the key. Casually she said, as much to reassure herself as anything else, “So, JinSoul. No Yves to come out and play? The others must be having a good time with her.”

“Are you sure she’s not on the other side, waiting?”

HaSeul froze and JinSoul laughed. Olivia shoved her flashlight in her face, and the foyer door slammed shut. As HaSeul composed herself, Olivia looked around.

“They’re all gone again.”

HaSeul didn’t know what to say to that, so she said nothing. She was right, the key fit the lock, and as the tumblers released and she turned the doorknob, they heard JinSoul’s voice one more time, corrupted by the house.

_ “Watch your step now, children.”_

***

There was a light switch to their right. HaSeul flipped it, knowing it wouldn’t work now but wanting it to be ready for them when they came back up.

“This is new,” said Olivia.

Her flashlight illuminated stairs leading down. They were made of gray metal coated with a rubber surface for traction. They did not creak at all as they descended, and the air was not as musty as HaSeul thought it would be. Almost-new drywall confirmed their suspicions. The basement had been renovated sometime in the last two or three decades, and been properly maintained since then.

At the bottom of the stairs was a helpful pair of signs. One pointing to their right was labeled “WATER HEATER & FURNACE.” The other pointed left and was marked “CIRCUIT BREAKER.”

“This is way too easy,” said HaSeul.

“Yeah,” agreed Olivia. “Want to make it harder?”

They both laughed.

“Hey, you’re even right about the wires being overhead!”

They soon reached the breaker box, embedded against the wall in the corner beneath the front office. For a second HaSeul thought it might be locked, with a separate, more modern key, but it just had a kind of turning latch to keep it shut. Inside, something looked funny to HaSeul.

“These are all smudged.”

“Some of them look like fingerprints.”

Olivia was correct. “Who the hell was down here to make that grubby mess?” asked HaSeul.

“Oh, you know. Probably one of the girls. The house can manipulate space and time, but flipping switches? Need humans for that.”

HaSeul snickered, and began flipping circuit breakers as fast as she could. She could hear a kind of hum as she did so, and towards the end she saw out of the corner of her eye some fluorescent lights come on back the way they had come, although this corner they were in remained dark.

“Mission accomplished,” muttered HaSeul in triumph, as she shut the breaker box. A shadow fell across the fluorescents, and Olivia reeled back in shock.

“Yeojin, is that you?”

HaSeul whirled around. There was a figure, in silhouette. As HaSeul raised her flashlight, she said dismissively, “It’s just her dumb phantom—”

But it was Yeojin in the flesh, still wearing her pajamas. Emotions flashed across her face under the beam of HaSeul’s light: hurt, and anger, and sadness, and finally a grudging sort of acceptance.

“They were right,” she said, her voice shaking. “You really don’t care about me at all.”

HaSeul was stunned. “Yeojin, is it really you?”

Tears let loose from Yeojin’s face, but she was furious. “Of course it’s me! Don’t you know me? Can’t you tell me apart from some dumb projection?”

“That’s not fair,” said Olivia, “you haven’t been through what we have. We were scared—”

“Shut up, you slut.”

Olivia was struck dumb.

“Don’t you dare lecture me on being scared. I was the first one taken, and instead of searching for me, you fooled around with each other.”

Olivia found her voice again. “Don’t ever call me that again.”

“Why not? I saw you. _I saw you!_ Kissing, letting her fondle your breasts. I was lost and alone, and all you wanted to do was get in each other’s pants.”

“What the hell, Yeojin?” said HaSeul, weakly.

Yeojin turned to her, enraged. “You, you keep your mouth shut!” She grabbed HaSeul’s flashlight and knocked it out of her hands, making her drop the candelabra, too. Both hit the concrete floor with a violent crash, the flashlight breaking and the candles going out.

_“Leave her alone!”_ shouted Olivia. She moved on Yeojin aggressively.

“Wait,” said HaSeul, but it was too late. Yeojin didn’t shrink back from Olivia at all, instead holding her hand out to receive her. Her fingertips touched the side of Olivia’s face, and she went limp, her flashlight and candelabra clattering uselessly to the floor as she fell to her knees.

“What…the hell…”

Yeojin held her up with one arm around her shoulder. With her free hand, she stroked Olivia’s face, then flicked her left eye. Olivia grunted in pain.

“Stop this right n—” began HaSeul, but then Yeojin turned to her, and she screamed in horror.

Yeojin’s eyes now glowed red like the phantoms.

“I almost had you, you know,” said Yeojin. “I almost had you the other day, and we could’ve been happy together for eternity. But you had to run—had to fight. Then _she_ showed up, and I realized I was wrong. No matter how much it hurt, I was wrong. I should never have loved you. You didn’t deserve it. You’re too selfish.

“I’m going to take her away from you, HaSeul. Don’t worry, I won’t kill her. That’d be too easy, and too fast. Instead, I’m going to take her where you’ll never be able to find her, not as long as you both shall live. You’ll both be forever just out of reach.

“May you live a thousand lifetimes alone in this house. It’s what you deserve.”

Yeojin pushed Olivia into the shadows, away from the fluorescents, and then they were gone.

***

Sunshine streamed into the basement from the open door. Outside the east hallway, HaSeul could hear birds chattering away. The electric lights added to the intensity of the midday sun.

She crossed the dining room slowly, blowing out those candles she could easily reach. She entered the parlor sobbing and tearful, forlorn, despondent, and utterly destitute.

She could tell immediately that something was wrong. Chuu and the others’ stuff was still there, by the fire, but all three of them were missing. She called out to them, but she knew in her heart that they would never respond.

HaSeul was all alone.

**Author's Note:**

> *12/14/2020 I realized that there was no good way for me to resolve the story in a way I found satisfactory. But I didn't want to just restore the previous ending, either. So, instead I decided that ending it at Chapter 7 made the most sense.
> 
> HaSeul has been on hiatus for almost a year now. I had finished the original version of Summit before her hiatus began. Ending the story now, in tragedy...it conveys my feelings about HaSeul's long absence almost perfectly. ㅠㅠ


End file.
